October 2017

October 30, 2017

When former vice president Al Gore was running for president, few thought he was the life of the party. That lack of pizzazz may have posed a problem for a presidential candidate, who, you may recall won the popular vote. Now comfortably removed from the White House scene, he’s way past that moment, raising awareness for environmental issues, particularly global warming. And last week, celebrating the DVD for An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power at The Monkey Bar, he addressed the crowd, cracked jokes, and chatted with everyone. The party was his!

October 24, 2017

In Marjorie Prime, in a not so far away future, humans will have primes, that is, hologram avatars of our deceased loved ones, enabling us to continue to work out the dicey parts of human relationships. This is the hopeful premise of Jordan Harrison’s award winning play Marjorie Prime, on which the movie of Marjorie Prime is based. Scripted by Michael Almeyreda who also directs Lois Smith, the original Marjorie Prime of the play, and an ensemble that includes Jon Hamm, Geena Davis and Tim Robbins, the movie hews close to the universal drama of family histories, how memory shapes and recasts the stories we tell about our intimate past.

October 21, 2017

A riveting, bejowled Woody Harrelson occupies the screen making LBJ something he wasn’t: a most charismatic president. Insecure, politically ambitious, Johnson became president under abject circumstances: the presidency was thrust upon him when JFK was assassinated. He wanted the job, but not that way. His personality, his conflicts with Bobby Kennedy, well played by Michael Stahl-David, and this liminal two-week period, form the core of Rob Reiner’s latest film, LBJ, from a script by Joey Hartstone. This week after a screening, Harrelson, Stahl-David, and Hartstone joined Reiner and Steve Schmidt for a panel at “21.” That Harrelson played Schmidt in the television movie Game Change became the inside joke of the lunchtime event. Then again, Harrelson is one of the great, most versatile actors of his generation. So yes, he can even play a Republican.

October 20, 2017

Journalists are imperiled all over the world, especially women, and more, women in cultures where rights for women at large are not guaranteed. Illustrating the remarkable contribution of women journalists, their courage, commitment, and sacrifice, the International Women’s Media Foundation luncheon, hosted by Cynthia McFadden and Norah O’Donnell at Cipriani 42 Street this week, began with mention of Daphne Caruana Galizia, who died of a car bomb last Monday in Malta. She had been investigating and reporting on her government’s connection to the Panama Papers. At a table adjacent to mine sat the parents of slain Swedish born journalist Kim Wall. As Andrea Mitchell, awarded for Lifetime Achievement in Journalism, wryly pointed out, a healthy news corps is our only way of watching what is going on, an alert to corrupt regimes. But of course in some circles, news is maligned as “fake,” and one of the honorees, Yemeni correspondent for Al Jazeera, Hadeel Al-Yamani, was denied a visa under the current United States policy. What threat does Hadeel Al-Yamani pose to the borders of America, asked Andrea Mitchell. If we can’t extend a visa to her, what is our freedom?

October 18, 2017

In Wonder Wheel,Woody Allen’s latest movie, Justin Timberlake narrates this tale as Mickey, a drama student at NYU and lifeguard at Bay 7 in Coney Island. A cute guy, and a gentleman, he’s into romance, and falls in love with two women: first, a would-be actress, now a waitress at Ruby’s Clam House, Ginny (Kate Winslet) is older than Mickey and married to a recovering drinker (Jim Belushi), who runs a merry-go-round. They live in the shadow of the Wonder Wheel, with Ginny’s son Richie (Jack Gore) from her first marriage, a nice boy in the habit of setting fires. The second is Carolina (Juno Temple), ex-wife of a mobster and Humpty’s daughter, and just the right age for Mickey, except that she is marked; two thugs from the world of the Sopranos loom large in a black car (Tony Sirico and Steve Schirripa), look to take her out. That’s the set up for Woody’s familiar tropes on tragedy shot on the stunning tuttifruiti boardwalk and sand by the great Vittorio Storaro.

October 14, 2017

“The last time I cast a nine-year old boy,” said director Simon Curtis this week, “it was Daniel Radcliffe.” This time, for his new movie Goodbye Christopher Robin, about the making of the Winnie the Pooh books, Curtis was referring to the impossibly adorable dimpled Will Tilston who plays author A. A. Milne’s son. At the premiere this week at The New York Public Library, after screenings at last week’s Hamptons International Film Festival, Will, who never acted before and who has never been to New York before was feted along with Domhnall Gleeson who plays his father Alan, and Margot Robbie, his mother Daphne. Forget the grim and lonely childhood Christopher Robin suffered with these self-involved parents. Festooned with giant Pooh bears, the library’s first floor had the majesty and magic of The Hundred Acre Wood, but best of all, at center was a vitrine with the original stuffed animals, including the beloved Eeyore, Tanga, Piglet, and Tigger, part of the NYPL collection.

October 13, 2017

Rita Wilson brings charm, confidence, and the comforts of relaxing with a close girlfriend to her supper club act at the Café Carlyle. “Tonight is going to be about relief from the world,” she says, and you believe her, because her lively combination of country and rock music is appealing, and because with all her L. A. glamor, movie star allure—when she casually mentions her husband, she says “Picture Tom Hanks,” because he is, --she is grounded enough to know what you want.

October 08, 2017

Kumail Nanjiani was in a heated conversation with Bob Balaban at Nick & Toni’s in East Hampton. Without ever having met him before, the Silicon Valleystar named a character in his hit movie of last summer, The Big Sick, on Balaban, and so it seemed at Variety’s 10 to Watch brunch that only six degrees of separation, or intimacy, existed among the talented young actors present for this beloved program of the Hamptons International Film Festival.

Even when she’s coaxing a cockroach out of her purse as a down and out chanteuse in 1930’s Paris, as she does as Victoria in the 1982 Blake Edwards directed comedy Victor/Victoria, Julie Andrews is classy. Screened at the Hamptons International Film Festival this weekend, just prior to a Q&A with Alec Baldwin, a Lifetime Achievement Award presentation, and a private party to celebrate the actress most well known as Mary Poppins and Maria from The Sound of Music, the movie’s gender bending issues feel charming and slightly retro in today’s world, and make for excellent entertainment. While Victor/Victoria earned several Oscar nominations, it won for Henry Mancini’s original music; Mancini’s widow was in attendance at the Guild Hall ceremony, a highpoint of this premier film festival, now in its 25th year.

October 06, 2017

Director Steven Spielberg seems too young to have a biopic made about him, a filmmaker perpetually in mid-career. His The Post, about the Pentagon Papers will be out this November, he told the crowd pressing around him at HBO’s dinner at Lincoln following the Alice Tully Hall premiere of Spielberg, to air this week. Documentary filmmaker Susan Lacy goes far creating a narrative of Spielberg’s career—and what a career so far! Beginning with footage of the epic movie, David Lean’sLawrence of Arabia as inspiration, the film shows Spielberg sneaking onto the Universal Studios lot and literally, in due time, commanding an office and a world in which to operate.